brake & wax

[jbdetailing]

What's the best product and technique for getting rid of brake dust , and what's the cheapest (price) but best wax/glaze/polish

[ChevyNick]

What's the best product and technique for getting rid of brake dust , and what's the cheapest (price) but best wax/glaze/polish

Well your about to hear so many opinions haha. Meguiars makes a Brake Dust Barrier that is supposed to work pretty well at preventing it. They also make a wheel cleaner to remove brake dust.

As far as a wax/sealant, Ultimate Paste wax is a darn good sealant for $20.

As far as polish goes, Ultimate Polish is really good for $8 or something.

[Murr1525]

Re: brake & wax

Assuming your have the stock painted type wheels, I would look at something like IronX followed by a paint cleaner like UC. Then Brake Dust Barrier after that good cleaning, so that you'll hopefully just need a mild soap in the future.

[CHzo6]

Re: brake & wax

Hey Matt- You've really jumped on the IronX band wagon lately, it's good stuff isn't it! Pricey, but good.

[Murr1525]

Re: brake & wax

I loved it... took brake dust off the wheels with no effort.

I hope TRIX works as good, since it is two products combined.

[Detailing by M]

Re: brake & wax

M135 Synthetic Detailer works great and is very inexpensive. literally pennys per rim. The new break dust barrier rocks! and I spray 135 every time I wash. I can easily just wipe off the dust/dirt with no problem what so ever.

[Michael Stoops]

Re: brake & wax

Since the subject of TRIX and IronX has come up here, as has our Brake Dust Barrier, we should probably re-post the following here, too:

Last week I had the opportunity to try some TriX on my car. For those who don't know about this non-Meguiar's product, it's sort of a combination of IronX and TarX in one bottle. These are pH neutral products that change color as they dissolve and break down embedded iron deposits, tar, etc and are supposed to be completely safe to use on paint, wheels, and virtually all automotive surfaces. The one big caveat is to avoid allowing the product to dry on plastic trim. So, I wanted to give this a go on the wheels of my daily driver to see how it worked. I sprayed it onto cool wheels and let it dwell for the time specified in the directions - actually, for a bit less than the time stated. The stuff did it's funky color change thing, bleeding purple from my wheels, telling me that it was doing its thing on the existing brake dust and other foreign material on the wheels. I then rinsed with water from the hose and to my horror the wheel was showing horrible white staining. It looked like I had used a strong acid based cleaner on a bare aluminum wheel - but these are fully clear coated wheels, polished lip and painted spokes, but fully clear coated. I've used Hot Rims All Wheel Cleaner (and the new All Wheel & Tire Cleaner version) and even Wheel Brightener numerous times in the past without issue. The wheels are several years old, but otherwise in great shape.

Needless to say, I was a bit freaked out about this. I dried the wheel and starting inspecting it closely to see what the heck was going on. If this product was supposed to be pH neutral and safe to use on paint, wheels, etc, then why the heck did it damage my wheels? Well, as it turns out, it did NOT damage my wheels at all. Let's be 100% clear about this - TriX did NOT damage my wheels. What it did do, however, was react with the Brake Dust Barrier on my wheels. How did I determine this? Well, when I applied BDB it was done as a test, so I had taped off half the wheel and applied BDB to just one half. When I was inspecting the wheel closely for damage, I noticed the white staining abruptly stopped at a very definitive line - very strange, don't you think? Well, it turns out the line where the "damage" stopped was also the line where the BDB stopped. And I had applied the BDB a year ago. Yes, a year ago! And it was still there, even though I had used All Wheel & Tire Cleaner and Wheel Brightener several times in that year. I was stunned!

OK, so the situation needed to be corrected - I wasn't about to drive around with this wheel half white and stained looking. Turns out a quick but somewhat heavy spray of BDB onto a microfiber towel and then wiped onto the wheel very quickly broke down the old application of BDB and removed it fully. The staining went away with it and the wheels look perfectly fine once again.

So, if you're looking for a really, really long lasting product to help protect your wheels, Brake Dust Barrier is it. But if you're a huge fan of IronX, TriX and TarX you might want to keep it off your wheels if they have BDB on them. It is extremely rare that we see strange product interactions like this, but things happen. Fortunately for me there wan't any real damage done, but it sure looked scary for a minute! This level of durability out of BDB was a real surprise though!

[Murr1525]

Re: brake & wax

Yes, I am trying to figure out a plan for spring/fall cleaning now... but at least nothing permanent, so can just try and see what happens.